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U.S. Lawmakers to Resume Work on Intelligence Reform By Mike Nartker WASHINGTON — U.S. lawmakers are expected this week to resume consideration of stalled legislation to create a national director to oversee the U.S. intelligence community (see GSN, Dec. 3). The intelligence reform bill is expected to be one of the main topics taken up by the House of Representatives as it reconvenes today. The bill, the result of weeks of negotiations between House and Senate members, has been in limbo since House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) refused to hold a vote on it last month. Hastert said that he wants a majority of House Republicans to support the bill before he will hold a vote. The bill has faced strong opposition, though, from two influential representatives — Armed Services Committee Chairman Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.) and Judiciary Committee Chairman James Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.). Sensenbrenner has opposed the bill because of concerns over a lack of provisions related to law enforcement and illegal immigration issues. Hunter’s opposition stems from concerns that the planned national intelligence director would disrupt the military chain-of-command and jeopardize the ability of commanders to receive battlefield intelligence, especially from spy satellites. A congressional source said today that a deal had been reached with Hunter to include language in the bill saying that the authority of the planned director “shall respect and not abrogate the statutory responsibilities of the heads of the departments of the United States Government.” At issue throughout the debate over intelligence reform is what role the defense secretary would continue to play in the intelligence community with the creation of the national intelligence director. Currently, the Defense Department controls the bulk of intelligence funding. Hastert’s office did not respond to calls for comment on the schedule this week for the bill’s consideration, including whether a vote would be held. The source said, though, that if the House were to vote on the measure tonight, the Senate would likely follow suit the next day. The compromise bill may now be facing, for the first time, a hurdle from the Senate side. On Friday, Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John Warner (R-Va.) reportedly expressed concerns similar to Hunter’s about the measure’s possible impact on the military chain-of-command. The congressional source said, though, that there was little concern over opposition from Warner, who has already backed the Senate bill. Facing repeated calls for greater White House involvement in the bill’s passage, President George W. Bush made the issue the focus of his weekly radio address Saturday. In his remarks, Bush stressed his support for the bill, placing the issue of intelligence reform among “everything necessary to confront and defeat the terrorist threat.” “I will continue to work with the Congress to reach an agreement on this intelligence bill. I urge members of Congress to act next week so I can sign these needed reforms into law,” Bush said. Supporters of the bill on both sides of the aisle said yesterday that they believed it would be approved in both the House and Senate if it were brought to a vote. “There is no question in my mind, at least, that if this bill were brought up for a vote in the House it would pass, it would pass with a goodly number of Republican votes, and probably most Democratic votes. It’s already passed in the Senate 96 to 2,” said Senator Jay Rockefeller (W.Va.), the top Democrat on the Senate intelligence committee. Rockefeller was referring to the vote tally for the Senate version of the intelligence reform bill, which was approved this summer. The House version of the bill was approved by a sizable margin, though not at large as seen in the Senate. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) noted yesterday, though, the concerns of some of his colleagues beyond Hunter and Sensenbrenner, as well as the need to reach a compromise. “There are a lot of people who have questions because we’re talking about safety and security. We’re talking about that soldier on the battlefield. We want to make sure he or she has good intelligence. And immigration is a huge issue that we’re going to keep addressing over this Congress, regardless of what’s in the bill,” Frist said on ABC’s This Week. “I think everybody’s going to come to the table in the best spirit of the way these bodies work, when they work well. We’ll come together and there will be compromise, but compromise that will be to the satisfaction of the majority of people in the House and the Senate,” he added. Senator Harry Reid (D-Nev.), who has been chosen as new Senate minority leader, said yesterday that Congress should not leave Washington until the bill is approved. “How can we leave town and not have this most important legislation passed? It may not be perfect, but no legislation is perfect. It’s something that we need to do, and the people of America are depending on us to do it,” Reid said on NBC’s Meet the Press. During a joint appearance on CBS’ Face the Nation, Rockefeller and Senate Select Committee on Intelligence Chairman Pat Roberts (R-Kan.) were divided on whether the bill could be handled when Congress formally reconvened next year. While Roberts said the issue of intelligence reform was likely to be discussed next year, Rockefeller said that waiting until then could kill the “momentum” for reform. “We won’t have the momentum of the 9/11 commission in exactly the same way. We won’t have the families of the victims in the same way. We won’t have American public opinion, people will be able to say in the Congress, we already tried that and it failed. It takes a lot of wind out of the sails,” Rockefeller said.
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